Edward Snowden, the man who risked everything to expose…
Class-action suit claims Otter AI secretly records private work conversations
The suit claims the popular service may be recording and processing millions of users' private conversations without consent.
He Leaked the Secrets of a Southeast Asian Scam Compound. Then He Had to Get Out Alive
A source trapped inside an industrial-scale scamming operation contacted me, determined to expose his captors’ crimes—and then escape. This is his story.
Copy of Digital Masquerade
The Digital Masquerade: Unmasking AI’s Phantom Journalists By Tony Eastin and Sandeep Abraham, CAMS
Collection: Just Security’s Coverage of Trump Administration Executive Actions
Ongoing coverage, including in concise “What Just Happened” expert explainers, legal and policy analysis, and other resources.
GPG Key Transition Statement - Michael Altfield's Tech Blog
After 8 years, I’ve decided to transition from my original GPG key and replace it with one that uses a stronger master key that meets NIST guidelines. Over 8 years ago–probably while lounging in my tiny dorm room in engineering school–I decided that I wanted the ability to communicate with my friends & family privately. I decided that I wanted the ability to encrypt my emails. I decided to generate a gpg key. In 2009–4 years before Edward Snowden unveiled that the US government was violating their own constitution by collecting & storing the internet activity of hundreds of millions of innocent US citizens–I generated & published my first gpg keypair. Since those teenage years, I graduated college with degrees in Computer Science and Secure Computing & Networking, worked for major tech firms, and begun working for the best independent journalism outlet in the US–Democracy Now! Though my colleagues, friends, & family infrequently used my gpg key in the past (don’t tell the NSA!), I finally work with a great team of people that take security seriously, and I’m using gpg to sign & encrypt my daily work emails. Unfortunately, my original master key was generated using gpg’s defaults . . . → Read More: GPG Key Transition Statement
The Deepfake Defense—Exploring the Limits of the Law and Ethical Norms in Protecting Legal Proceedings from Lying Lawyers
Thousands of audiovisual images documented the insurrectionists who stormed the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021. Authorities subsequently collected those images and charged some for their criminal conduct. Given the overwhelming audiovisual evidence implicating the insurrectionists, it should be impossible to assert a plausible defense claiming that those unmistakably depicted in the images were not present. Right? Wrong. As the defense in the federal criminal trial of January 6th insurrectionist leader Guy Reffitt illustrated, the emergence of “deepfakes” has changed the landscape of plausible defenses to crimes. Reffitt led the attack on the Capital. Videos and other visual images showed him at the head of the crowd advancing on the Capitol’s West Terrace. He was arrested and charged with multiple crimes. And although the evidence, including audiovisual images, against Reffitt, was clear and overwhelming, his lawyer undermined it, arguing to the jury that the evidence against Reffitt was a “deepfake” – an audiovisual recording created using Artificial Intelligence technology that allows anyone with a smartphone to believably map one person’s movements and words onto the image of another person. Unfortunately, the law does not provide a clear response to Reffitt’s lawyer’s reliance on deepfakes as a defense. <br><br>But this much is clear—the “deepfake defense” is a new challenge to our legal system’s adversarial process and truth-seeking function. Because the norms of professional ethics require lawyers to advocate zealously, deepfakes invite lawyers to raise objections and arguments to evidence to exploit juror bias and skepticism about what is real. Thus, lawyers may plant the seeds of doubt in jurors’ minds to question the authenticity of all digital audio and visual images, even those counsel knows to be genuine.<br><br>Currently, no rule of procedure, ethics, or legal precedent directly addresses the presentation of the “deepfake defense” in court. The existing standards provide scant guidance because they were developed before the advent of deepfake technology. As a result, they do not solve the concern of how to deter lawyers from exploiting it. Although in the last several years, legal scholarship and the popular news media have addressed certain facets of deepfakes, there has been no in-depth commentary on the “deepfake defense.” This article is the first to explore the deepfake defense, locating it within the historical and current framework of lawyers’ efforts to fabricate evidence and the laws and the practice norms that exist to curb that conduct. It proposes a reconsideration of the ethical rules governing candor, fairness, and the limits of zealous advocacy and urges a re-examination of the court’s role in sanctioning such conduct. Thus, this article offers novel proposals to guide the way forward for lawyers and courts as they traverse this new technological landscape.
"Pushed into the Shadows": Evidencing Digital Surveillance Chilling Effects and the Erosion of the Rights to Freedom of Assembly and of Association
SummaryThe United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Rights to Freedom of peaceful assembly and of association, Gina Romero, presents "Pushed into the Shadows: Evidencing digital surveillance chilling effects and the erosion of the rights to freedom of assembly and of association". This Global Study documents the profound impact that pervasive digital monitoring exerts on fundamental public freedoms. Moving beyond traditional privacy-centric narratives, the Study details how contemporary surveillance ecosystems induce serious chilling effects.
Nigel Farage Reported to Met Police Over Alleged Misconduct in Public Office
The Reform UK leader's non-disclosure of a £5 million 'gift' from a crypto billionaire could amount to a criminal offence, leading democracy groups allege
The Deepfake Defense—Exploring the Limits of the Law and Ethical Norms in Protecting Legal Proceedings from Lying Lawyers
Thousands of audiovisual images documented the insurrectionists who stormed the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021. Authorities subsequently collected tho
Pluralistic: Surveillance vs guillotines (11 Aug 2026) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow
In the summer of 2013, two esoteric, technical, incredibly important texts were published within weeks of one another: the first is the Snowden leaks, which revealed a system of global, pervasive digital surveillance; the second was Thomas Piketty's Capital in the 21st Century, a book about the economic inevitability (and political instability) of oligarchy:
Pluralistic: Surveillance vs guillotines (11 Aug 2026) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow
In the summer of 2013, two esoteric, technical, incredibly important texts were published within weeks of one another: the first is the Snowden leaks, which revealed a system of global, pervasive digital surveillance; the second was Thomas Piketty's Capital in the 21st Century, a book about the economic inevitability (and political instability) of oligarchy:
Exclusive: ICE agents investigated for sexual assault, bribery, drug smuggling
Records obtained by Newsweek reveal 148 allegations of misconduct and potential crimes.
The WIRED Guide to Protecting Yourself From Government Surveillance
Donald Trump has vowed to deport millions and jail his enemies. To carry out that agenda, his administration will exploit America’s digital surveillance machine. Here are some steps you can take to evade it.
DHS Demanded Google Surrender Data on Canadian’s Activity, Location Over Anti-ICE Posts
Using a 1930s trade law, Homeland Security targeted the man—who hasn’t entered the US in more than a decade—following posts on X condemning the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti.
How to Responsibly Report on Hacks and Disinformation
The run-up to the 2016 U.S. presidential election illustrated how vulnerable our most venerated journalistic outlets are to a new kind of information warfare. Reporters are a targeted adversary of foreign and domestic actors who want to harm our democracy. And to cope with this threat, especially in an election year, news organizations need to prepare for another wave of false, misleading, and hacked information. Often, the information will be newsworthy. Expecting reporters to refrain from covering news goes against core principles of American journalism and the practical business drivers that shape the intensely competitive media marketplace. In these cases, the question is not whether to report but how to do so most responsibly. Our goal is to give journalists actionable guidance.
Bringing Sexy Back
Internet surveillance has killed eroticism. We need privacy to reclaim it.
